


Out of History Into History and the Awful Responsibility of Time

by cognomen, MayGlenn



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: (By Old We Mean 30), (The Kind That Can Actually Happen), Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Gen, Growing Old Together, M/M, Major Character Death (offscreen), Pining, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-02-25
Packaged: 2019-03-05 12:39:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 20,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13387980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cognomen/pseuds/cognomen, https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayGlenn/pseuds/MayGlenn
Summary: “Really? The whole thing?”BB-8 gives an affirmative beep.“Can you fix it?”Poe doesn’t have any fuel left, the V-Wing’s running on reserve emergency power. He’s got his flight suit on, too, so worst case scenario even if the cabin depressurizes (common enough in these old Nimbus rockets) he’ll have a day’s worth of air.“BeeBee-Ate,” he calls, and the droid burbles back, slightly distracted. “Where are we? What’s the nearest occupied planet?”A pause for calculation and triangulation. An answer.“Off the chart? What do you mean off the chart?”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> “We shall come back, no doubt, to walk down the Row and watch young people on the tennis courts by the clump of mimosas and walk down the beach by the bay, where the driving floats lift gently in the sun, and on out to the pine grove, where the needles thick on the ground will deaden the footfall so that we shall move among trees as soundlessly as smoke. But that will be a long time from now, and soon now we shall go out of the house and go into the convulsion of the world, out of history into history and the awful responsibility of Time.”
> 
> -All The King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren

BB-8 beeps a frantic warning as all of the sensors and indicator lights blaze and scream at Poe as space blurs around him and every atom in his body seems to try and drag him back. There’s no friction in space; Poe knows this logically. There’s no friction, no drag, nothing but energy. Of course his X-Wing (and every other starfighter manufactured since the old republic) generates a frictional field so he can maneuver it; that’s basic stuff. What were defensive shields but increased areas of friction? Regardless, it shouldn’t feel like gravity, like his body was weighed down and moving was difficult, like when he reaches out to cut the power to the hyperdrive (one thing that _isn’t_ moving slowly is the fuel gage, plunging down toward nothing) he’ll never get there. 

Finally he does, yanking himself out of hyperspace early even as he hears the drive in the old V-Wing fizzle and pop and the impact of coming out seems to punch Poe center mass between the shoulders, jerking him forward as the ship drops back into normal space, driving the breath out of him for a long second like when he’d fallen out of trees once or twice as a kid.

Poe doesn’t panic, he just wheezes in a thin trickle of air, and then sits back, waiting for his diaphragm to unlock and his heart rate to slow. Hyperdrive malfunctions don’t have a great survival rate. He glances back, out through the canopy and up at BB-8, who beeps a query.

“That was weird,” Poe agrees, voice thin and a little strained as he finally gets his breath back. “What happened?”

BB-8 beeps.

“Really? The whole thing?”

Affirmative beep.

“Can you fix it?”

Poe doesn’t have any fuel left, the V-Wing’s running on reserve emergency power. He’s got his flight suit on, too, so worst case scenario even if the cabin depressurizes (common enough in these old Nimbus rockets) he’ll have a day’s worth of air. He doesn’t like the idea, but he’s stuck. He doesn’t even have enough fuel to get the V-Wing drifting toward someplace habitable, but maybe…

“BeeBee-Ate,” he calls, and the droid burbles back, slightly distracted. “Where are we? What’s the nearest occupied planet?”

A pause for calculation and triangulation. An answer.

“Off the chart? What do you mean off the chart?” Poe asks, trying very hard not to feel panic.

BB-8 calculates how far they’ve gone at the speed they were going along the hyperspace lane, and adds that they’d jumped the rails. They were lucky not to have gone into or through any planets, rocks, debris, asteroids, stars, astral bodies, black holes…

“Alright,” Poe says, and BB-8 cuts the report short. “I guess we’ll take our chances.”

He activates the emergency beacon, making his little ship a brilliant blip on the radar of anyone nearby, and hopes that there _is_ someone nearby, out here in the furthest reaches, the unknown places. It would be just his luck to be picked up by the First Order again, but even that was a more survivable scenario than picking a random direction and hoping his drift would carry him somewhere before he ran out of oxygen. 

Then, all there is to do is wait. Poe leans back in the uncomfortable, beat up pilot’s seat of the V-Wing, and remembers his training. Slow your respiration, keep from panicking—not that he ever feels truly panicked behind the controls of a starship. BB-8 beeps a query.

“I’m alright. If you pick anybody passing by up, let me know. I’m listening,” Poe says. “I’m sure this’ll all be over before we even know it. I mean, if we really are where we say we are, it’ll be a bit of a trip back, right?”

BB-8 affirms.

“But still, no big deal. We’ve been in worse scrapes before. A couple extra days of travel back to base is nothing,” Poe says. He keeps his eyes closed, finding it strange how just a few minutes—23, according to his chrono—could take him so far. Not all of that had been in hyperspace. “Hey, BeeBee-Ate, how long were we in hyperspace?”

The answer is eight minutes and a little over two seconds. Poe shakes his head and shrugs. Just a malfunction. Weird luck. He blames it on superstition, and puts his hand over the necklace that’s under all his layers. He hadn’t gotten to say goodbye to Finn, that was unlucky, but sometimes it happens. He’d left his regards with Rey in an awkward kiss to her cheek that he wasn’t sure if he should apologize for when he got back. One of those spur of the moment things that he still wasn’t really sure about with her, as they sorted their relationship out.

Hopefully they won’t worry too much, and he decides when he gets back in a couple days, maybe he can face the music and have a conversation with Rey. _I mean, she’s just the only Jedi in the galaxy._ And she’s dating his boyfriend. Nothing to worry about. 

Really the unluckiest thing was having to fly this heap at all because there were no other options. Of _course_ the hyperdrive went out. Poe hadn’t expected this particular type of failure, but he’d known any kind of failure was possible in this clone-wars era relic. 

BB-8 beeps a proximity warning, and then a big cruiser of some make he’s never seen before comes out of hyperspace, and Poe sits up. It’s not familiar, but it’s not a star destroyer. Perhaps some kind of nonhuman craft. Poe hopes his translator is programmed for their language and diverts some emergency power to his comms, hoping they’ll answer and decide he’s worth robbing or rescuing; either of these scenarios he can work with.

“Unknown starfighter vessel, this is the _NRS Organa_ . You’re speaking to Captain Kiiya, please identify yourself.” The voice is oddly high-pitched and gravelly, but speaking Basic. Maybe not human, then? Poe catches, before the comms click over to him, someone whispering in the background, _‘Where did you dig up that old fossil?’_

The ship cruises beneath him, getting him within tractor beam range.

 _Tell me about it,_ Poe agrees with the quieter voice, supposing they at least recognize his ship, even if he has no idea what theirs is. “Captain, I'm sorry to trouble you but I've suffered a hyperdrive malfunction and now I'm out of fuel and inoperable. I also seem to be lost.”

He clicks the comm back over to receive, and then seems to realize what she'd said earlier. To BB-8, he asks, “Did she say that ship's name was the _Organa_?”

“Roger that. We'll tractor beam you into our hangar. Stand by.”

Maybe an ally? Someone out there finally responding to Leia’s call for aid? Poe doesn't quite know what to make of it. Even when BB-8 confirms, he asks them again. “I'm sorry, Captain, your ship is the _Organa?”_

“Yes, we're out here on an exploratory mission: charting and scientific discovery,” said a new voice as the comms click over, male, perhaps the deck officer. “Must have been some hyperdrive malfunction, there, to have you end up out here with us! Okay, we're bringing you in. I didn't catch the name?”

They _seem_ friendly, and they say they’re a science expedition. Poe crunches the math as the tractor beam locks onto his ship. He’s not sure if they’re saying that because they don’t know who _he_ is, and he’s not sure if he should give his proper name because he doesn’t know who _they_ are. Ultimately, he thinks it’s about as unlikely that he found some kind of undercover First Order mission, especially calling their ship as they do. He makes a split second decision.

“I’m Commander Poe Dameron, formerly of the NRDF myself,” he says, and then he wonders if maybe this ship has been so far out for so long that it hasn’t heard that the New Republic doesn’t exist anymore. Could word about Hosnia Prime not have reached this far? “Thanks for the lift, by the way.”

There's a pause that's just long enough, and then the voice sounds less friendly, or like they've seen a ghost. “Uh, right. No problem. We're bringing you in now.”

The starfighter shudders as the tractor beam locks on.

[I have a bad feeling about this] BB-8 says.

“Me too, all of a sudden,” Poe agrees, but he tries to look on the bright side. “It sure could be worse, buddy. We can figure out how to escape if they’re hostiles later. In the meantime, I’ll be glad to be out of this rusty bucket and into something that can generate its own air.”

He realizes he’s nervous with how much he’s talking. BB-8 beeps a reassurance as well, and Poe goes quiet, paying attention to his surroundings as the tractor beam draws the V-Wing into the massive hangar bay of the ship. The ship doesn’t seem to have a lot of activity here, surprisingly. Poe doesn’t see that it’s equipped with more than a couple fighters. He _thinks_ they’re fighters, anyway. He doesn't recognize the make.

Most of the rest look like transports, which make sense. After all, they’d said they were out here to learn. He wonders what sorts of things they have seen. Certainly enough that there’s an armed group of guards waiting for him, and BB-8 beeps a low swear given that  two of them are carefully covering the ship with drawn blasters.

Poe displays his hands where they can be seen through the canopy.

“Please exit the craft,” the gruffer, security officer’s voice requests over Poe’s comm, and he does, carefully, slowly.

BB-8 chirps a warning at the guards that Poe shushes, his hands still in the air and well away from his blaster as the guard relieves him of it.

“Any other weapons, sir?”

“Not on me,” Poe says. “There’s a blaster rifle in the ship. Safety’s on.”

He doesn’t tell them where to find it, figuring that they’ll sort it out themselves, before the security officer—a stern-faced and fairly brusque fur-covered biped, that Poe is _pretty_ sure is a Selonian, though he’s never met one face to face before—gives him the order to follow. The other guards, who fall in behind Poe in a way that makes him a little uncomfortable given his recent history, seem to at least all be human. 

“So,” Poe tries, cheerfully as he can manage. “You guys find anything interesting out here?”

“Ghosts,” one of the human guards says, in a tone Poe can’t read, before one of the others elbows him to silence.

A Twi’lek with pale green skin and a crisp uniform Poe doesn’t recognize strides across the hangar.

“Boy, if he’s _really_ Poe Dameron, you’re gonna be in trouble, Zaxie,” he tells the security officer, then beams at Poe. “I’m sorry about this, Commander. Just a routine interview. Can’t be too careful in these uncharted territories. Come with me?” 

He’s polite enough, though the security officer and several guards join them as Poe is escorted to what he can tell is an interrogation room, even if it’s very clean and doesn’t look like it’s been used. There’s...a pot of caf brewing, and a basket of pastries, that look slightly out of place.

“I’m Lieutenant Tandrallio, sir,” the Twi’lek says. “Sit down. Ignore the meatheads with guns.”

“We know where you sleep, Tandrallio,” one of said meatheads chuckles.

Not strict on protocol, then, though they appear to be military, and allege to be Republic.

“Can I get you anything?”

Poe doesn’t have an immediate answer; he’s still taking in all of this. The crew is…well, obviously a crew of familiar bodies who have been on a starship together for a while. The rest is nothing like anything he’s familiar with, except perhaps in that it does seem military.

“Caf will be fine, Lieutenant, thank you,” Poe says, politely. He’s not really hungry, he’d just had breakfast (a rarity for Poe Dameron) a few hours ago. “Can I ask when this vessel launched? I’m not familiar with uh, the designation or the mission…”

He hadn’t been very high up in the NRDF, just a wing captain when Leia had pulled him after his interference with the _Ysira Zyde,_ but he’s sure he’d have known about this. Maybe they’d launched long before…yet the crew looks relatively young. He’s never been great at judging Twi’lek ages. It’s even harder when he’s supposed to ignore the ‘meatheads with guns.’

Something about this whole situation is just wrong. So, Poe sits, trying to decide how much of the truth he can—or should—tell.

“Unfortunately, a snack or beverage are all I’m at liberty to give you until you verify some things for me, Commander,” Tandrallio says amicably. “Cream? Sugar? It’s a very dark roast.”

Poe takes a sip, agrees with the description offered, and adds cream, surprised to find that it seems to actually be liquid instead of the powdered stuff. Apparently this was a well outfitted ship, or at least seemed that way after his exposure to Resistance rations for a little while. He tips his cup, drinks a long slug of it. “It’s good.”

“Right?” When they sit, Tandrallio pulls up a datapad. It’s a shiny new model Poe hasn’t seen before. “All right, can you just verify some things for me? Name, birthdate, serial number?”

These questions Poe _can_ answer, given that it’s essentially all you’re supposed to give the enemy anyway. He repeats his name, his serial number (rusty in his memory, he hasn’t thought of it for a couple of years), his date of birth, adding, _testing,_ “I was stationed out of Mirrin Prime. With the Hosnian system gone, that’ll be the best place to look for my records.” 

“Great, great. Can you give me the name of your parents? Place of birth? Which academy you went to?”

No visible response to the loss of the Hosnian system. Poe considers this as he gives his answers: either they already knew, and the ‘how’ was as mysterious as the origins of the ship, or what Poe said hasn’t registered as important. Maybe they think he’s crazy, or they’re trying to place him as a potential space pirate or something.

After Poe passes these and several more innocuous questions with flying colors, Tandrallio puts down the datapad. “Well. Your ship fits the records we have. My last question is going to sound rather odd, Commander. Can you tell me the date it was when you jumped into hyperspace?”

“Today,” Poe says, easy as that. He checks his chrono again, then displays the date still showing on the device. “In the process of frying itself, the ship blew all its fuel. It’s junk, but uh, it’s all I’ve got at the moment…”

Poe fades out, hesitant to even mention the Resistance. He reaches out for BB-8 and gives the droid a pat. “BeeBee-Ate says we were in hyperspace for only eight minutes. I can’t believe we’re all the way out here…where did you say we were again, exactly? All I know is ‘off the charts,’ and trust me, I have some pretty big ‘charts.’”

Tandrallio nods, and stands up, snapping a smart salute. “Commander Dameron, it’s been an honor questioning you. I think the Captain will like to speak with you, now. And she’ll answer all your questions. Please, help yourself to refreshments, and—and, _thank you_ , sir. For all you did.” 

The Twi’lek leaves abruptly, as do the men with guns, and Poe is left alone.


	2. Chapter 2

“Uh, what?” Poe asks the empty room, utterly astounded. He glances down at BB-8, who looks up at him in equal curiosity. “Buddy, did any of that make sense to you?”

BB-8 beeps a negative, and informs Poe that the door is still locked.

“Yeah, I’m not really surprised,” Poe says.

He’s not alone for long, however. But the next person to enter is an Ewok—tall, for an Ewok, but an Ewok, wearing a small Republic uniform, with Captain’s bars on her shoulder. When she speaks, Poe recognizes the high-pitched voice from before, though it’s otherwise very clear Basic. “Commander Dameron. I’m Captain Resaa Warrick Kiiya. I suppose you have some questions.”  

“Yes,” Poe says, standing to attention in the presence of the ship’s captain and now absolutely certain this wasn’t a First Order trick, and obviously utterly baffled. Terex might have gotten up to things almost on this level as far as spycraft and infiltration, but Poe’s certain that no Ewok would ever make any sort of peace with any remains of the Empire. He has about a million questions, but the first one that comes to him is— “Did you say Warrick? You have family on Endor?”

“My uncle, yes. He fought with General Princess Leia Organa on Endor, long before I was born. Please, let us sit.”

First, however, she climbs up onto the table to pour herself a cup of caf, and then jumps table to chair without spilling a drop. “I must say it’s an honor to meet someone who also fought beside the great Leia Organa, for whom our vessel is named and in whose honor we explore the galaxy.”

“I still do,” Poe says, trying to follow along, trying to do some math on how long Ewok lifespans are, and realizing he doesn’t remember much except his father telling him never to eat the food at any Ewok parties. He looks into his caf a little suspiciously as he returns to his seat. “My parents met your uncle, I think. Briefly. It’s an honor to meet you, too.”

“I plan to treat you with a _bit_ more hospitality than my uncle treated your parents,” she says, with what Poe has to guess is a grin.

He hesitates only a second, getting a little tired of the runaround. “I didn’t know this ship, or any ships on missions like this beyond the outer rim, existed as part of the New Republic.”

They hadn’t answered his questions before about it, but maybe if he fishes around a little more carefully for information they would.

“Of course you won’t,” she answers, straightforward. “We launched after your disappearance, Commander. After the end of the war.”

“After my—?” Poe attempts to figure this out. To puzzle the information together. After his disappearance…when he went AWOL from the NRDF and joined Leia? _Which war does she mean? The end of the conflict with the Empire?_ “You mean, when I left the New Republic. After the _Ysira Zyde_?”

“No, Commander. Your disappearance from the Resistance. In the ship we just found you in. On the date recorded on your chronometer. My scientists are looking into explanations now, but here’s the report…”

Holding it with both paws (Poe notices her claws are filed short and smooth), she hands over a datapad. The large red letters that stand out read “MIA” across the top. “You’ll find today’s date in the top-right-hand corner for comparison.”

Poe’s silent at first, the information trying to impact somewhere in his thoughts but failing miserably to land. He looks blankly at the datapad; there’s a picture of him, specs for his ship, identifying features, contact information. He blinks at all of this.

Once, in science class when he was a kid (he remembers the day had been _sweltering_ , and Poe had been melting out of his seat and wishing he was home with his mother even if it _was_ watering stupid koyofruit trees and not flying), his teacher had demonstrated what happened when you aligned the two same-pole ends of a magnet. How one had pushed the other away, repelling it, or flipped the magnet around to the opposite pole. His brain is trying to do that, now.

“What kind of _weird joke_ …” he starts, looking up at Captain Kiiya. He looks at the date again. “ _Ten years_? You think I’m gonna buy that?”

“I’m afraid that’s the truth, Commander. I am sorry,” she says, sympathetic, but not pussyfooting around. “Right now, my scientists’ best guess is that your hyperdrive way overshot you. More than point-five past light speed. Probably faster than _we_ can travel, even in this ship. Time is a funny thing, but I assure you this is no joke. Your droid has been given clearance to access our holonet connection, and all our records. I will answer any questions you may have.”

Poe looks down at BB-8, and the droid looks back up at him, and then the little yellow data-reception light comes on on the droid’s dome. The initial exclamation from the droid doesn’t bode well, and BB-8 actually recoils back at the amount of data. Poe’s heart sinks. Why fake all this? Even out here beyond the rim, maybe _especially_ out here beyond the rim. He looks at the data pad again, then up at her.

“How do I undo it?” he asks, on pure instinct.

“Ahh,” Captain Kiiya says, and stammers something in Ewokese, briefly. “We're...trying to figure that out. If there was some spatial anomaly, a wormhole you went through, or, hells, if the _Force_ was involved…”

She chitters to herself again. “I don't know that you _can_. Even for us, time travel is still, as far as we know, a one-way trip.”

Poe sinks back, data pad limp in his hands, and tries to absorb the information. It feels impossible, utterly and completely outside the scope of anything he expected. He’s _trapped_ here? And he can’t get back? But they _need_ him, he needs to get back.

 _I have to help…_ But that thought terminates. He’s sitting on a New Republic ship. She’d said the war was over, whatever that means. _Does_ it mean anything? Poe actually feels a little dizzy. He puts his cup of caf and the datapad hastily on the table and leans down, putting his head into his hands, dropping the elevation of his brain to somewhere near his knees.

“Your lieutenant said…he talked about…” Poe tries. It’s the first thought he can collect, even as he studies the floor tiles of the room, which seem to swirl in front of his eyes ominously. He tries again. “This ship is the _Organa._ Where is she? I need to speak to Leia.”

Maybe he already _knows_ but it’s easier than asking the question, even as BB-8 rolls closer, chirps a warning about Poe’s blood pressure and heart rate, and Poe takes one of his hands off his temple to reach out and put his hand on BB-8’s reassuring dome. At least he isn’t _alone_.

The Captain’s eyes shine. “She has gone to join her ancestors in the Force. Three years ago, the year this ship was built. The night the New Republic Senate ratified its constitution. She died peacefully in her sleep. They say she chose the hour, when her work was done.”

Poe is repulsed, not by the news, but from the very thought of even trying to accept it. His entire spirit wrenches backward from the notion, embodying the whole concept of ‘ _No.’_ He’s angry, and it threatens to spill over, like it had aboard the _Raddus_. He wants to shout, to throw furniture until they tell him the truth, to tear whatever trick or dream this is apart with his bare hands.

She presses her knuckles to her damp eyes, and says a short prayer for the dead, thumping her breast. “The whole galaxy mourned for a week. Her memorial service was magnificent, though there was no body. General Finn spoke at it.”

Then, as suddenly as the violence of the emotion overtook him, it just…ceases. It’s too much, he can’t even comprehend it. He doesn’t know _how_ to feel, except lost and alone and betrayed by…everything. He has to get back to where he belongs, and he knows it’s not here. So, Poe takes a deep breath, he scrubs his hands through his hair, finds his eyes wet in absence of any real solid reason why, and presses the heels of his hands against them, and leans back.

He remembers another science class when he was older and cared more because good marks meant a better application to the Academy. The teacher had explained spacetime relativity, how if you actually did approach the speed of light, time would seem to pass at a normal rate for you, but eighty years would have passed where you started.

Finn’s still out there, that’s something. Poe wonders if Finn even _remembers_ Poe as anything other than a war comrade, someone lost early and violent in the struggle. Poe breathes in again, until he’s dizzy. He doesn’t want to hear anymore. “Okay, I just…let me fix my ship. Borrow some fuel.”

She’s already said he can’t get back, but he’s not so sure. He _does_ know if he outlines his plan, crazy as it is, she’ll try and stop him. But if it worked one way, damn it, it has to work the other way. He and BB-8 can go back to where they belong.

Kiiya expects, perhaps, more of an outburst, and seems surprised by the angry calm. “Well, of course. We'll give you anything you need. A faster ship, even. We—would be honored to bring you back to the Core ourselves. You're a scientific discovery yourself, you know. But, yes. Anything. Can we start with a meal and a refresher and a bed? Would you like to make a communication? This far out we're limited to text only, but my records show your father is still alive. Admiral Wexley would also love to know you're back, I'm sure.”

“ _Admiral_ _Wex—”_ Poe yelps, but then he collects himself, stops everything short in a way that anyone who knew him would know didn’t bode well. The news that his Father is alive should hit him like a relief, but Poe can only think of getting back to where he belongs. To _when_ he belongs. He shakes his head in firm denial of everything. “Just some tools, ma’am. And fuel.”

“O-of course, Commander, but—”

He’s never felt more strongly, at least since the day he’d packed his bags and gone off to boot camp, the urgent desire to go back home. Not the version of it that exists here, but the one he remembers. If he can’t get _that_ , well. He can go back to Kes, at least. He can fix the ship, get BB-8 to blow the hyperdrive the same way it had before, dump fuel on it, go back the other way and it has to…has to _what?_

What if he slips another ten years into the future, gets lost beyond the edge of the galaxy? Poe’s vision spins again, the floor seems to get closer. He stands up, abruptly, and turns for the door. Outside, it has to be normal. He has to wake up. Something has to click into place and make this real. But the door opens only to reveal two slightly surprised security guards, obviously interrupted mid-chat about what an unusual discovery they’ve made, and Poe sweeps by them, following his remembered route back to the hangar.

“Follow him, make sure he doesn't get hurt, or hurt anyone,” the Captain orders, and the two guards follow Poe.

Everyone Poe passes stares openly or whispers, or snaps a salute or to attention at the sight of him. In the hangar, the stern deck officer greets him again.

“Commander Dameron,” he says. “Can I...help you? My people and I would really rather not send you out in an _antique_ , if you must go.”

“Oh my gods, it's BB-8!” shrieks one of the younger deck crew, like she is meeting a celebrity, and BB-8, ham that he is, turns right around to greet his adoring fan curiously, Poe forgotten.

Now the two guards caught up, their sidearms still in their holsters and hands outstretched. “Please don't leave, Commander! We have so many questions! You blew up the Starkiller!”

“You saved General Finn! Started the stormtrooper rebellion!” says the other.

Something about her bearing reminds Poe of Finn before her companion reveals, “Daxa here used to be a stormtrooper, too.”

“It's an honor to meet you, sir. Can I shake your hand?”

Poe gets swept up in the tornado, finds himself with his hands clasped around hers for a shake, though the contact feels strange and distant and unreal to him.  He’s surrounded by them, and they all _know_ him, know his life, or parts of it.

“My teacher says we'd have never won the war if you hadn't left the Republic when you did,” says a _very young_ looking deckhand.

“I,” Poe manages, but the picture of it all is too much to ignore and the idea finally spikes a root into his tired, scrambling mind. He manages to finish, “Missed a lot.”

“All right, back off. Leave the man alone, he's had a day,” the deck officer, ‘Zaxie’ the Twi’lek had called him, says, shooing the younger crowd away, and the guards take a few steps back. BB-8 rolls back to Poe's feet, chagrined.

Poe sits down without thinking about it for the second time today, but at least with his eyes on the old V-Wing he can be _sure_ he hasn’t slipped out of the world entirely and gone to some other one. BB-8 nudges against his side, and Zaxie peers down curiously, before he simply sits down as well, as if it’s the most natural thing to do.

“I’m not sure I’m not hallucinating while I suffocate to death,” Poe admits. BB-8 burbles an assurance that his vital signs are elevated, but not dangerously so. “The war is _over_?”

Zaxie nods. “Some several years now. The Republic’s been rebuilt on the ideal of moving forwards, understanding.”

“It feels like I _have_ to get back and help them fight,” Poe says.

“Of course,” Zaxie agrees. “But you _did_ help them fight. You inspired them—and all of us, in part.”

Poe looks back up at the V-Wing, probing around the mass of shock at his center, and says nothing for a long moment. There’s nothing _to_ say.

“If I got back in that thing,” he begins. “Put the hyperdrive back together. Put fuel in it, and pointed it the other way…”

BB-8 beeps a negative.

“I don’t think so, either,” Zaxie agrees. “And this may sound cruel, but I’d rather you didn’t, Commander. Maybe some of my best friends wouldn’t be here with me on this ship today, if not for what you stood for.”

Some little light in Poe’s soul extinguishes, and he firms his jaw. Nods once. He should cry, but it would be stupid. What’s he _mourning_? It’s not real enough yet. The people can tell him everything, anything they want. He can learn the whole history, but what does it matter? He wasn’t there. Poe gets up, reaches up to touch the V-Wing over the hull.

“I’d like to go home, please,” he says. “ _Please_. I don’t care how.”

“We can definitely do that,” the deck officer says. “I think we're planning to turn around. Should be back to Coruscant or wherever you want to go in about twenty hours if we burn fuel.”

He smiles, all teeth, though it's ultimately comforting. “We weren't kidding about you being the greatest discovery we've made so far, sir.”

“He's from Yavin III, Zaxar!” one of the kids says, with complete confidence that he's right.

“Four,” Poe corrects, absently. “Where the base from the Rebellion was.”

The second kid elbows the first back, grinning. “See?”

Poe sighs, and then offers his hand to Zaxie-Zaxar, or whichever of those is his real name, shakes it firmly, and then arches his eyebrows, amiably. “I’d probably really appreciate it if you guys stopped calling me a discovery. Also I just ran out on your Captain, and I should probably apologize.”

“You know, that's fair. We can do that.” He gets up, and helps Poe to his feet. “I'll take you back to the Captain, maybe get you the VIP suite. You look a little pale, even for a human.”

The Captain is waiting for them just outside the hangar, and she nods at them both. “Zaxar, I hope you didn't let your little vulture droids pick him apart.”

“Look, I'm a deck chief, not a babysitter. Should I comm the engineer to prep for hyperspace, ma'am?”

“I've already asked her to meet us on the bridge,” the Captain replied. She looked up at Poe. “Come on, let me show you around. When we get to the bridge, you tell us where to go.”

Touring a ship is an easy distraction, and Poe is immediately grateful for it, even as BB-8 occasionally exclaims or comments over some archival download he’s receiving. Poe looks down at the droid, glad he hadn’t come out alone, glad they were together. “Thank you. I’m sorry I uh, sorry I left so abruptly back there.”

Of course it’s forgiven, like he’d forgive it in anyone else the same thing, after the experiences he’s had. The ship is a marvel, and the air of people trapped in a war doesn’t live on it.  For Poe, that’s perhaps the strangest part. There’s no tension, no fully guarded preparation. No readiness for an attack by a known enemy.

“Where’s she…General Organa,” Poe says, keeping his voice level. “Is there a monument?”

“Several,” Captain Kiiya reports. “The largest is on Yavin IV, where, as you know, the most Alderaanian refugees settled. But there's one on Coruscant that’s a nice park, a fountain on Naboo, a few military scholarships in her name, and of course this ship. There’s a marker on some place called Ahch-To, with her brother, the Jedi. I believe they buried what was left of Kylo Ren there, too. No monument, though. The caretakers marked the graves and don't like people visiting, as I understand it. Cultural Preservation Act, that Leia Organa initiated, actually. Did a lot to help Endor, too.”

Poe lets this absorb slowly, and supposes it makes sense. Monuments everywhere, because Leia Organa’s monument _was_ the galaxy. Her legacy. Even the ship. She’d gotten to do what she wanted, and then she’d left it behind. It seemed like her, but damn if Poe doesn’t feel like he’d like to talk to her again, like if anyone at all could make sense of this situation, she would. “I’ll, uh, I’ll visit the one on Yavin Four.”

He stops suddenly. “Have you told anyone about me?”

“I notified the fleet admiral that we picked up your craft. I'm afraid you're a bit above my pay grade. So...Admiral Temmin Wexley knows. You knew him, right?” She waits before the entrance to the bridge. “But it's up to you if you want me to send any more comms, and when. The whole galaxy will want to know you've returned.”

“I'm…” Poe says, uncertain. “I'm not sure I'm ready for that, yet. I'm not even sure I'm ready for Dad, yet.”

He needs to see it, first. To live it, at least long enough that it seems real, enough so that he won't doubt even his own identity.

“I'd like it if you could keep it to yourself,” Poe says. “I know that sounds suspicious, and that Admiral Wexley—I can't get over that—has to know. But, give me a guard if you have to, I guess. I gotta…I want to be ready.”

“No guards, Commander. The war really is over, and we’re not scared of you. A guide, if you want one. And we’ll do our best to keep quiet about this, though you’ve got everyone pretty excited.” She strides onto the bridge, where everyone immediately jumps to attention, and, at the sight of Poe, bursts into applause.

“You see what I mean?” she tells Poe with a wink, and then turns to her crew. “Looks like we’re headed back a bit early, folks. Plot us a course to Yavin IV. Let’s get this man home.”


	3. Chapter 3

Over the course of the next day and a bit it takes to get back (Poe is impressed by this, the way the ship skillfully maneuvers hyperspace at a speed beyond what he's used to), the reality goes from a numb, terrified surface realization to…something real.

He learns the history; how Leia and Finn took the ragged remains of the Resistance and welcomed in factions of stormtroopers who had mutinied or abandoned post. As many as joined the fight just deserted outright, wandering away for normal lives, scattering through the clutching fingers of the First Order, leaving them ragged and depleted.

The fight had still been bitter. Very. Poe looks at the lists of the dead and wonders why he isn't on it, why no one in ten years had buried _him_ without a body, the way they'd done for Leia. Maybe if they had, he could walk away now and do what so many stormtroopers had. Start over, somewhere else. The cowardly thought is very tempting.

He keeps a lot of company after that first thought of leaving creeps in. The one that sounds like running away. He makes friends among the crew of the _Organa_ , and tries not to spend too much time alone. They don’t really let him.

They manage to offload him off at Yavin IV without a parade, and Poe thanks the whole crew, promises to keep in touch, means it.

He covers his face with a pair of goggles and a deactivated breather mask to avoid attention when he visits Leia’s memorial, speaks to her, tells her he's glad for everything the galaxy is now, and then walks back to the farm. _What's_ General Finn _like?_ he wonders. _Where was the man now?_ Poe has avoided looking at what either he or Rey are up to, but hopes— _knows,_ maybe—that they're together.

 _Ruling the galaxy._ Somehow, Poe doesn't feel a right to walk in on that after ten years. He wasn't there for it, didn't help build it.

BB-8 chirps at him, having learned not to let his human be silent too long.

“Yeah, it'll be good to see Dad,” Poe says. “You'll like him. Do you think I should have sent word ahead?”

It felt like the sort of thing you should do in person, coming back from the dead. Yavin is different, now. Bustling. Poe actually walks past the old farm road because it's paved, now. The lane is different. Houses built along it, which jangle and jar against Poe’s memory and make him feel lost and wrong.

“BeeBee, you ever feel like you can't go home again?” Poe mutters, rhetorically. He tops the last rise down into the valley where Kes established his Koyo grove, now nearly half a century ago, and stops dead.

Nothing is right. He knows this place, but it doesn't know him, and everything is different. There are dozens of workers. Animals, droids, more koyo trees than he'd dreamed of, kids running around and at the center of it all, telling Poe how truly not lost he is, the Tree. Poe balks away from it, both astounded and repulsed by the unfamiliar industry.

“This is…” Poe starts, lost, looking around the whole operation from behind his goggles, which he takes off as if they could fool him, and tries to understand.

Then, his eyes fix on Finn, drawn like the magnetic field of his thoughts expected nothing else, and his heart feels like a fist is squeezing around it. Finn, right down there. Older, now, not old but _grown up_ , laughing and working with a group of men and women his own age or younger. Poe actually backs up a step.

There’s no place for Poe here. Not anywhere. Who is he to walk into this and change it all?

“...A mistake,” Poe says. BB-8, already halfway down the slope in front of him, turns back and beeps something confused. “We should get out of here.”

Poe is running, halfway down the other side of the hill, having far outstripped his droid, when something powerful catches him right in the chest and knocks him flat on his back, all hard enough to bruise.

“What’s your hurry, thief?” a vaguely familiar voice demands, but when Poe looks up, the face absolutely is familiar. It’s Rey, taller, stronger, dressed in fine but simple farmer’s clothes, and bearing a long, stout pole that is the source of the ache in his chest. Her hair is loose and down to her waist, and one of the hands that grips the pole is obviously mechanical.

When she recognizes him, her face flickers through surprise and joy to automatic distrust, though she drops the pole—

Only to call to her and activate a lightsaber with a golden blade and point _this_ at him instead. “Is this a trick? If you are Poe Dameron, you’ll prove it to me, now.”

( _It looks just like him_ , she can’t help but think to herself, an old wound reopened and aching.)

Poe is looking right at her, and his thoughts are all as scattered as the breath dashed out of him, but he can't think of a single thing to say. _Rey,_ his thoughts connect, like the old match the picture games from when he was a toddler, where you'd hold up a card and then match another with the name on it.

BB-8 has already bleeped a joyful shriek to see Rey, regardless of how she's just attempted to kill his human, and rolled up to her to greet her excitedly, though when she brandishes a lightsaber, she gets admonished harshly for it.

Finally, Poe coughs, “I'm not a thief, I _live_ here.”

Not the brightest moment of his life. “Or…I did.”

That isn’t much in the way of proof, but BB-8, who she feels she knows intimately, appearing out of nowhere with him, _is_. “Beebee—Poe!”  

Now she seems to believe him, because she hauls  Poe to his feet and yanks into a hug. “You’re alive! Finn was right, you’re alive, you came _back_!”

Then she punches him in the shoulder. “That’s for kissing me and then disappearing, you utter _arsehole_!”

“You remember that,” Poe says, rubbing his shoulder idly, and of course she does, it's that kind of thing. “Sorry. That was awkward, uh, and…”

But she’s laughing too hard to listen to his excuses, and then she drops to her knees, lightsaber and pole forgotten, to greet BB-8 with perhaps more enthusiasm even than she’d greeted Poe with. BB-8 is thrilled to see her, babbling at lightspeed about how much he missed her, even if it was only for a few days, to him.

Poe Dameron stands outside time looking in. Rey has aged, though she's still young. Not quite thirty, Poe realizes, with a start. He feels insulated, isolated, and he's not sure how to reach out. “You took care of him for me. Finn, I mean. Thank you, uh, and I'm sorry.”

He's not sure what for. Mostly for missing…everything.. He feels unable to explain so much right now, and Rey is looking at Poe intensely again. Waiting for him to say _something_ , to explain himself.

“I didn't know all this was here,” he says, lamely.

“Of course you didn’t. You just got back.” After adjusting BB-8’s antenna, Rey stands up, and gives Poe another hug. “I’m glad you’re back. Finn missed you. I missed you.”

She holds him out at arm’s length, and cups his face with her hands, staring at him like she can’t believe he’s real. He looks far more handsome than she remembers. “Come on. You have to see Finn.”

“I was just thinking that I shouldn’t—” Poe starts

“MAA!” comes a shout, and some tramping through underbrush over the hill. The voice sounds slightly annoyed, and female, and young. “Mama!”

Rey rolls her eyes slightly, and turns to call back. “I’m down here, Leia!—” Then she gives Poe a sharp look, worried— “Y-you heard, right? About—the General?”

“I…” Poe tries to process the information, but he nods. “I was at her memorial today. I heard. It, uh, I came here on the _Organa._ ”

“Good. It’s a beautiful memorial, isn’t it? Finn designed it. Also wouldn’t let them build one for you. Said it would be weird when you got back.”

When the girl tops the rise, she looks Poe over and is clearly not impressed. A Twi’lek child, barely out of toddlerhood, who immediately seeks contact with Rey, who might not be her _mother_ in one sense, but has clearly accepted guardianship of the child. Poe, if he were a betting man, would guess Finn forms the other half of that relationship, and he feels even more wrongfooted and awkward.

He wants to go _home_. Not this; this isn’t it anymore. This is all foreign and strange and he doesn’t belong. The roads are different, the people are different. “I guess you and Finn came to help Dad out, huh?”

Poe can’t take his eyes off the kid. _Of course they wanted a family, you idiot. Who doesn’t? They probably have a couple of kids of their own, even. Maybe right about eight or nine years old…_

He shakes himself, tries to find the grounding point.

“He helped us, too,” Rey says. She hoists the girl into her arms: blue skin almost going purple, and huge green eyes. She rests her head on Rey’s shoulder, staring at Poe. “You want to say hi to Poe, Leia?”

“No,” she sighs, almost angelically.

Poe offers a helpful wave, an encouraging smile. “Hi, Leia.”

“You know who Poe is, right? From Daddy’s stories?”

“Yeah,” she says, in the same tone, almost bored.

“No ‘hi’?”

She shakes her head.

But Rey laughs. “Don’t worry, she’s like this with everyone. Come on down to the house and meet everyone. Your dad is going to—”

Rey suddenly bites her lip, as if thinking about something sad.

“He’s going to be so happy to see you,” she finally manages.

Poe, for an instant, actually wonders if he should doubt that. He wonders if he should have known better than to come. He doesn’t _want_ to meet anyone, he realizes. He hesitates, visibly, and then realizes he can’t run from this. He wants to see his dad, and the rest is complicated, but maybe it’ll work itself out.

“Rey,” he says, carefully. “I don’t know if I can handle all of this. I’m still, uh. I mean I just saw you, in my experience, a few days ago. I’m—it hasn’t been ten years, for me.”

“It hasn’t been ten years for Finn,” Rey says, giving him a hard stare. “He’s left an extra place at the table, everyday, waiting for you to come back. You and I were just starting to—and then you were gone. And your father—well.”

She sighs, hard. “You need to see your father. He’s fine most days but...he thought he lost you. So, I don’t actually care if _you’re_ ready to see him. He needs to see you.”

“I came to see him,” Poe says. “I did. But what part of all this is a world I know?”

He gestures around, to all the developed housing areas, to the workers now coming and going along the road, giving Rey curious glances to see who the newcomer is. Poe knows the answer, but he doesn’t _feel_ like a place has been left for him, no matter if they set the table with an extra plate or not. He didn’t mean to go, he knows, logically, the world had to go on without him. He’s glad it did, because everyone looks happy and well adjusted and—it’s just a _mess._

Poe turns away from her abruptly, ignoring BB-8’s whistle, and he heads back over the rise, ignoring every stare, every curious face, every _ordeal_ he has to make of himself in front of his own home just to get inside and even _that’s_ different. A group of strangers looks up at him from their places in the family room, a pair of kids bolt past him and bang out the door, laughing.

There are Lifeday cards on the mantle—from Snap, from Connix, from Jess Pava and Rose ( _together_ together?), and from many more people whose names Poe doesn’t recognize. There are toys scattered around, a highchair for feeding a baby at the table, and what looks like part of an X-Wing nav panel has been used to build a surprisingly lifelike play kitchen.

There’s no place here to collapse, so he hikes his chin higher, trying to toss off the whole weight of the world coming down. He can hear Rey calling after him, so he goes deeper, but every which way he turns there’s an invasion that he can’t understand and all he’d wanted was something familiar to ground himself to. Poe finally bangs his way out the back door, works the combination lock on the root cellar ( _that_ hasn’t changed) and shuts himself into it. It’s musty and dark and it smells familiar and he can just.

Sit down.

And implode.


	4. Chapter 4

Rey follows him to the house, but sighs and stares after him as he retreats down into the root cellar. Poe _felt_ a mess, and she knew she wouldn’t help at this point. But she knew who could.

“Why did Poe go down there?” Leia asked, sucking on one of her lekku.

“He’s hiding. It’s a game. Let’s go tell Grandpa Kes to find him.”

All at once, Leia animated, wriggling to get down from Rey’s arms to rush inside.

“Grampa, grampa!” she called, running through the house. “It’s a game! Someone’s in the root cellar!”

Kes was sitting in his usual chair by the window. It was a less than good day, which meant he wasn’t even pretending to read the datapad on his lap, but was just sitting and staring. But he managed a bright smile for Leia as soon as she rushed in and clambered up onto his lap. “Grampa, dere’s a—”

“A-ah,” Rey said, coming in behind. “Don’t give it away.”

Rey leaned down to kiss Kes’ cheek. “How are you today, Dad?”

Kes shrugged at Rey, and patted Leia’s back softly. “Can we play a game later, sugar?”

“ _No_ , grampa! You gotta go now! It’s a surprise!”

Kes sighs, feeling old. Some days he is sure these kids are the only thing keeping him alive. “Okay, sweetheart. I’ll check.”

He shuffles when he walks, these days, using a cane most of the time. He looks at Rey as he passes her, asking her to level with him. “What’s down there? Are Han and Luke up to shenanigans again?”

“I promise it’s not them,” Rey says, amused. “Just go see.”

“If I break my neck down there…”

“You won’t break your neck. You can do it. Go slow.”

“Go slow!” Kes laughs, his honor impugned. He straightens up a little, bodily, though he doesn’t feel it in his heart. “You make me sound old!”

He takes the back steps carefully anyway, though there are only two of them, and then punches in the combination to the cellar, surprised that the door was closed again if someone was down there. He swings it open, admitting light, but it’s fairly dark down within.

“Go away,” Poe calls out, vehement. It’s dark down here, and probably the only familiar place left, though it’s damp and cold and full of dried Koyo fruit. Of course he’d get home in the winter. He doesn’t want to see anyone.

Kes squints at Rey, not sure what to make of all that, but he heads down inside anyway. There’s someone—not a kid—sitting in the back corner, away from where the light reaches, holding his knees to his chest. The position, and the vulnerability of it, are enough to wake an old ache in Kes’ chest because Poe used to hide down here, just like that. When he was small, after Shara was gone. Mostly when her loss was too much.

 _This_ figure looks up, quiet. “Dad?”

About the only person Poe can handle right now.

Kes is sure he’s dying, sure that this is a heart attack hallucination, or he’s already in the Force and he’ll see Shara, too, somewhere, because that’s _his boy_ , that’s Poe, just as he last saw him.

“Poe?” he croaks, and drops the cane and _runs_ the last few steps between them. Poe’s sitting on a crate, and Kes drops to his knees in front of him, heedless of how his body creaks, because his aches and pains don’t matter anymore, not if he has his son back. He grips his arms, cups his face, and yes, all real, and tears stream down his face. “Poe, Poe, my son. It’s—it’s you, you came back.”

Poe eases off the crate, right down onto the ground with Kes, so that he can get his arms around him, and _that’s_ real. That’s what’s left of Poe’s world, except for BB-8, perhaps. He just leans right in and puts his face against Kes’ chest and hides there. Kes is _thinner_ than Poe remembered, and looks older than Poe even knows he is, tired and worn by life in a way that seems like it’s been more than Kes’ share, and Poe knows that’s an effect of all this.

“Dad, I’m _sorry_ ,” Poe says. “And I don’t understand, and it’s all so... “

So much. Everything.

“It’s okay, son. You’re okay, we’re all okay. You’re back, that’s all that matters,” Kes murmurs, pulling Poe toward him until his son sprawls awkwardly across his lap and Kes can drop tears in his hair.

He squeezes Kes tighter, gets squeezed back in return. Poe feels almost instantly better, even though _now_ he’s crying. For Leia, for how strange and confusing everything is, for not being strong enough to just know how to pick all this up and run with it. It’s been ten years for them, they carried this, and Poe’s the one who can’t handle it. For a while, he’s just quiet, until the fear and uncertainty run their course, and all of it’s easier to face down here, anyway. It always was.

“It’s okay, boy, I’ve got you. You’re home and I’ve got you. I love you. Everything’s alright now.” Kes keeps up this litany for long minutes, just rocking them like this, until they’ve both had their cry. He doesn’t ask what happened, or where he was, or why he doesn’t seem to have aged a day. It almost doesn’t matter. And maybe, like the superstitious old farmer he is, he’s worried that asking will break the spell and send Poe away again. “We missed you.”

Like the way they both miss Shara.

Poe realizes he’s missed Kes, too. He’d spoken to him just _days_ before, telling him that no matter what the First Order reported about the fight, he was safe, Leia was safe. That they were going to get the Resistance back together. Since coming to terms with the reality that it was abruptly and unchangeably ten years in the future and everything Poe knows has stopped mattering, Poe’s missed Kes. Needed him.

“I missed you too,” Poe admits. “I need you. Sorry, dad. Sorry.”

It’s the only thing he can think of to say, and he holds onto Kes’ hands even as he leans back, looking his dad in the face. It’s _different,_ sure, but that’s still Kes. Still the same expression that always helped Poe through every tough spot he wasn’t strong enough to get through himself. He shifts then, sits up a little more, but doesn’t stop holding on to Kes. That feels real and solid.

“What _is_ all this, Dad? All these people?” Poe asks. “They’re everywhere.”

He’s trying not to resent this, and Poe knows he shouldn’t. He doesn’t want to feel uncharitable towards these people, because he knows they wouldn’t be here without some kind of good reason, but he also can’t understand what he’s stepped into.

Kes laughs, an almost manic, crazy-old-man laugh. “What does it matter? What does any of it matter? You’re _home_ , my boy.”

Kes grabs his face and kisses him on the forehead, and squeezes him again. He all but leaps to his feet, feeling like a young man again, and when he pulls Poe up, too, he hugs him again, just to be sure. “Come on. You’ve got to meet everyone. _Stormtroopers_ , most of them, if you’ll believe it! Deserted, or rescued. There’s a government program for—well, I’ll tell you all about it. Hired hands. Good kids. And the _kids_!”

Kes squeezes Poe’s hands urgently and lowers his voice. “I’m sorry for everything I ever said about how much trouble you got into as a kid. You were a _saint_ compared to the twins!”

But he’s laughing as he tugs Poe back out toward the light. “Come on, son. They’ll all want to meet you!”

Poe hesitates, wiping his face, tugging his shirt straight, though his hands stay in the hem, twisting and pulling in a nerve-wracked gesture. He understands, it’s Kes’ replacement family. Poe’s glad he took Rey and Finn up close, glad he’d found something that was worth being here for. And, well, they’re just _people_.

Kes will be there with him. Poe feels guilty for feeling like he doesn’t want to have to be introduced to everyone living here, even though he’d never have resented Kes for inviting them to be here if he’d stayed around. Digging deeper, he resents being displaced, and then replaced in something so utterly different, like having the rug yanked out under his feet, and all he can expect afterward is to make do with the changes and try not to screw things up with the fact that he’s…going to screw everything up because none of what’s happened to him is normal.

“Alright,” Poe says, though he sounds uncertain. They’re all going to hate him, if he doesn’t buck up and put on his game face and find a way through this. He wipes his face on his sleeve again, and it doesn’t feel like it helps, but he straightens his shoulders and puts on his best commander face. He’d had his moment to be vulnerable. Count to ten. Work it out.

Upstairs, there’s a bit of a commotion. Poe’s tired of being that, too. Hopes this time, it’s someone else.

“Hey,” Kes stops them before they go out again. “I’m sorry, son, look. Are you okay? I don’t know what—or where—but if you’re not ready… We can stay down here. As long as you like.”

He smiles, remembers Poe climbing up in the Force tree after Shara’s funeral, and not wanting to come down. _We can stay up here_ , Kes had told him, _as long as you like_. The unsaid part was then as it is now: _I’m not leaving you_.

“It’s been a long few days, dad,” Poe says, honestly. He won’t lie to his father, he never could. He pauses, reaches down to pick up Kes’ discarded cane. “But that’s it, for me. A few days. I don’t know how to relate to.... The war is over, and I wasn’t there. This is all different, and I wasn’t here. But I wasn’t…anywhere else, either. I don’t know how to feel about everyone in the galaxy knowing my name like I’m some person I don’t know how to be.”

He doesn’t offer the cane back, instead carrying it at his side. His chest hurts, and Poe tells himself it’s because Rey hit him.

“Well, let’s sit, then,” Kes says, easing himself onto the steps that lead up. He lays a hand on Poe’s knee and squeezes. “The war started ending so shortly after you disappeared—in no small part because of you and everything you did for us. You saw the beginning of the end. And we just—put our heads down and—”

Kes sighs. “No. _They_ did. Your Finn and Rey. I was pretty useless those first years. But, ah. Finn. Hard to be down with him around. And then they start bringing home all these kids, and stormtroopers to work the land, and buying more land, and—I didn’t have time to miss you anymore. It was like Finn always said, somehow knew. You were away, and you’d come back.”

Here, it finally begins to make sense. To slot into place. He eases closer to Kes, so they’re sitting hip to hip, as they had when Poe was small. It’s just as comforting now, with Kes explaining everything.

He pulls Poe in again to kiss his temple. “And you did. So, you don’t need to be anything but _you_. Back home, where you belong.”

“Alright,” Poe says, and that feels real, finally. The notion of home. Kes is here, so it’s real. The rest he can get used to. Even moving around with caution until he knows where he fits. He takes another deep breath, and this time when he firms himself up, it’s a little more believable. “Home. _Alright._ ”

And he has to thank Finn and Rey for taking care of Kes. Without him, Poe’s not sure he could do this at all. “How’s…how are Finn and Rey?”

It’s a strange sort of question, in that Poe doesn’t mean health, but happiness.

Kes shakes his head, unable to do anything but marvel at them. “They’re amazing. They saved the galaxy, and then came back to our little podunk farm and saved _me_. They just—” he laughs— “showed up one day, said, ‘Sir, I would marry your son if he were here, so can you just be our dad, anyway?’ It wasn’t quite like that, but basically. I needed them. And they just wanted to be _loved_ , poor things.”

Then Kes catches something in Poe’s face, perhaps, and elaborates. “They’ve been all right. Happy. They love each other, and those kids. I don’t think they could hate anyone. I’m not even sure I believe Finn was ever a stormtrooper. Doesn’t have all the baggage most of the others have. If Finn or Rey were ever unhappy it was because they missed you. Rey always hoped, I think, but Finn _knew_ you’d be back. I mean that, Poe. He got me believing it, most days. Thank the Maker he was right.”

Kes is crying again as he hugs Poe.

Poe hugs back, grateful beyond words for his friends. He supposes that’s what they are now, at least for the moment. There’s a brief flush of guilt for all the times Poe had considered retreating, not facing any of this, but even in his heart, he knows that was never an outcome that was actually possible.

“I’m not going anywhere, Dad,” Poe says. There’s nowhere to go, no one to fight. At least until Poe figures out what’s next, he’s here, and it seems like there’s an awful lot of ‘next’ here, in keeping all this running. Maybe that’s why Finn and Rey were here, too. Finn, at least. If he believed Poe was coming back, all this time, then he had to guess it would be to here. “I don’t quite know how I fit, here, but if there’s any place I fit left, it’s gotta be here.”

Kes squeezes his shoulder. “Look for the holes, son. You'll fit right in.”

Poe takes a deep breath, fortifying himself. “Show me around, but uh, take it easy on me. If you’ve turned my room back into a kid’s bedroom, I understand, but I don’t want to see that yet.”

Kes laughs loudly at this, but reveals nothing.

“And, I should see Finn.”

This sobers Kes quickly, and he nods, heaving himself up. “Okay. We'll find Finn first. See who we see on the w—whoa!”

Kes is nearly bowled over by two boys—human, twins, with dark enough skin that Poe wonders if they're Finn's and Rey's—but the way they play at hand to hand combat makes Poe think they might have been stormtroopers, too.

“Ah! Sorry, Grandpa! What were you doing in the cellar?”

“Who's this? _—Hey_ , you're Poe!” The twin wearing a green shirt says, pointing.

“No, he isn't!”

“Is so! You're in the pictures!”

“Now, now, Luke, Han, don't antagonize each other. Luke's right, this _is_ Poe,” Kes reveals. “And we're very happy to see him —”

Luke has already launched himself at Poe, wrapping his arms around his waist in a hug. “You came you came you finally came! Does Dad know yet? Will you take me flying, Poe?”

Poe, trapped in the middle of an argument about his identity (again) finds it easier to take from a pair of kids, even if one is giving Poe a dark, suspicious look. Poe supposes he might, too. By process of elimination, that one’s Han, and on closer look they aren’t an identical pair, just close in height, sharing enough features for brotherhood.

“We’re just on our way to find Fi—uh, your Dad,” Poe says, finding _that_ an awkward juggle. These kids are _tall_. Maybe not Finn's and Rey's. “I’d be happy to take you flying, but I don’t have a ship. Your mom’s not teaching you how to fly already?”

He confirms this with a glance at Han, who crosses his arms over his chest and stonefaces him. Alright, fair.

“She is, but not fast enough for this little speed-demon, I think,” Kes says, and adds in a whisper, “Shoulda known, calling him Han.”

“I uh, happened to see F—your Dad up in the fields as I came in, do you know if he’s still up there?” Poe asks, feeling stupid about it. As if Finn could have slid off the earth into another dimension or something—Poe would never again believe that wasn’t possible.

“Yeah!” Luke says, tugging Poe's hand. “Man, he's gonna be so excited! I bet he already knows you're here. Dad knows lots of stuff like that. Come on, I'll show you!”

As they walk, Luke trying to pull Poe forward like an overexcited puppy, Kes slings one arm around Poe and the other around Han and gives a little sigh, like his world is back as it should be.

“We found a whisper-bird nest that fell out of a tree,” Luke was explaining, “and Dad says we're gonna pick what fruit we can before we put it back. And we'll mark it so we can come out and see the baby birds grow up! They're soooo cute!”

“No they're not, they're ugly! They haven't got any feathers!” Han protested, and the brothers began to argue, perhaps in the showing off for company way.

“You haven’t got any feathers, either,” Poe offers, by way of neutral outside opinion input, and Luke gives him a grin for the backup that could melt the hardest heart. Maybe that’s the moment when Poe feels like they’ve really won the war.

But they stop as they see Finn, now bent over a piece of machinery with a young girl, maybe a teenager—another daughter?—saying, “Well, I dunno, Kira, maybe we better ask your mother on this—”

“Dad! Dad, look who's here!” Han and Luke began shouting, sprinting ahead to Finn, who stops dead.

Finn hadn't believed it every day. It was hard to maintain, that certainty that Poe would come back. But he had loved Poe, had a connection with him, and he knew he wasn't dead, his Force was still—on _this_ side.

He had been surer after Leia died, because he _felt_ that, knew with certainty she was gone.

And now he’s here, he had come back, and looks like he had never left.

“Finn,” Poe says, going just as still, and he has another one of those strange, out-of-time moments. Except for Kes’ hand still on his back, steadying Poe like a nervous animal, Poe might have receded from it for an instant. But it’s _Finn_ and he’s alive and he looks older, and somewhere between stumbling forward to get his arms around his friend on pure instinct, and putting his hands on either side of Finn’s face so they can touch foreheads, he realizes that _Finn_ is older than him, now.

Finn didn't remember actually starting to run until they were colliding together like they had all those years ago after their first separation, and Finn is saying the same thing he said then, too, through tears streaming down his face, “Poe Dameron, you're alive!”

“Thank you,” Poe says, feeling less like he has to say he’s sorry. “You took care of my dad, and... “

There’s too much to cover. The corner of Poe’s mouth turns up as he steps back, suddenly aware of all the eyes on him and how _close he is to everyone’s dad_ , and maybe he shouldn’t be touching Finn this much. “You completed my mission, Finn.”

Finn doesn't let him go—swears he never will, after all this time—and in fact pulls him closer. “Poe. Poe, I knew you'd be back! I knew—Poe, you—you're—”

“I know, buddy, everyone was _saying,_ ” Poe is laughing, trying to reassure Finn.

Finn is overwhelmed with emotion, babbling, actually crying, and in full view of everyone he kisses Poe like he can fit ten years’ worth of kisses into one.

For this moment, Poe can forget everything else. He gets his arms around Finn’s broad shoulders as they kiss, and while everything else has changed, this hasn’t. Maybe it’s a little more intense this time, and Finn’s so sure of himself when he kisses now, but it’s still, all of it, just like it had been in Poe’s much more recent memory. _This is supposed to break the spell, right?_ It’s a traitorous little thought, but Poe doesn’t want to open his eyes, either.

“ _Dad_ ,” an indignant voice chides, the patent tone of an embarrassed teenager, while the rest of the kids either giggle nervously, or add a variety of less flattering sound effects.

Poe leans sharply away, guilty, and steps back, jamming his hands into his pockets and looking instantly apologetic. He actually backs up so fast he runs into Rey, who steadies him, with Leia still clinging to her leg.

Then, he doesn’t know what to say, aside from, “Uh, thank you. Again.”

“How did you get back?” Rey asks.

“It’s not a very long story, actually,” Poe says, hands bunched up in his pockets and body tense. The kids are all still looking at him like he’s just kissed their dad (not because they seem affronted by that, but in the normal sort of, _ew, our parents who are not real people, shouldn’t do romantic stuff_ way kids have, so at least he hasn’t just ruined someone’s lifeday or something). “Where is…?”

BB-8, as if on cue, rolls past from behind the half-repaired farm machine at full speed, beeping encouragement to a young Abednedo child in some kind of game of tag.

Poe coughs. “Nevermind.”

Finn laughs, a relieved, half-sobbing sound, and wipes his eyes, and still hasn't let go of Poe. “Wow. Ah. What were we doing?”

“Dad, the tractor—”

“Blast the tractor!” Finn laughs. “We're taking the day off! Poe, did you meet everyone? Leia, Luke and Han, Kira, Shadrak. Where are—no, never mind. Kira, please go tell all the hands to take the day off?”

Kira grins wryly at her father, who is very clearly not actually her father, judging by the wildly red hair. “You're so weird, dad, but okay.”

He beams at Poe, like he's the sun in the sky, and squeezes his hand.

“It's time to celebrate.”

“I don’t mean to—” Poe tries, but he’s swept up in the tide, as Rey helps Finn and Kes herd him back toward the house. “I didn’t want to _disrupt_ —”

“You have, and you’re going to,” Rey tells him, but her tone is sweet and gentle. “Just relax, Poe. It’s not like you if you can’t relax.”

He makes a further noise of protest, but they override him, and Poe _tries_ to relax.

“How many different kinds of ships can you fly?” Luke asks, after a conference with Han in which a wager seems to have been staked.

“I can fly anything,” Poe assures, confidently. “Maybe if it’s really new, I’ll need about twenty minutes to look at the controls first.”

“You blew up Starkiller base, right?” Kira says.

Poe’s not sure if that’s accusatory. “Your Dad, Mom, Han Solo, and _Admiral_ Wexley were there helping. Also Jess Pava. So, I was there, helping too, but I wouldn’t say _I_ did it.”

“That's not what Uncle Snap says,” Luke said.

“Nor Auntie Jess!” Han adds.

Luke slips his hand in Poe's free hand, leaving Rey to sling an arm around him.

“And you were on Jakku!” the Abednedo says. “When Dad left the First Order. I was there, too! Only I was a baby, so I don't remember.”

“I was, but only for a short amount of time, and most of that _I’d_ rather not remember,” Poe says. “But I met a really crazy Blarina, there.”

Rey, Kes, and Finn smile proudly at the children, who, except for Leia's usual standoffishness and Han’s usual stubbornness, are warming up to Poe immediately.

“Grandpa, where's your cane?” Kira exclaimed all of a sudden, offering him a hand.

“My dear, my _son_ is back. I could dance a jig!” Kes tells her, but he takes her offered arm, anyway.

Finn can't stop grinning, at all of this. It's hurting his face. But here's his family, all together, all happy and healthy and _here_. He can't imagine being happier.


	5. Chapter 5

Later, when his story (there isn’t much of it, just like Poe had said) is told, and he’s extracted a promise from Kes  _ not _ to attempt to kill Snap next time he sees him—

“I asked him not to tell,” Poe says. “I mean, I just thought, uh, I thought it should be in person. That it would be better to—”

“You’re right,” Kes cuts off his stammering. “But I should still threaten to kill him for keeping secrets from me.”

—and the kids have mostly gone to bed, except Kira who seems old enough to set her own schedule, Poe finds a minute to catch his breath. He’s met stormtroopers today and learned about the program here that helps the ones having trouble get therapy and experience a normal life and re-integrate into the galaxy. He’s met exactly five children that call Finn and Rey their parents, and to his surprise learned they’re all adopted, even the twins. 

It’s all warm and whole and functional already, which is where Poe sticks on the matter. He withdraws from contact, tries to find a place that doesn’t feel strange or awkward or like he’s standing where someone else belongs, and for the most part, he fits in. Of course with his own dad, and the kids mostly seem to like him, which is baffling to Poe, but he supposes if they were raised with all this going on, they’re used to a lot of comings and goings. 

He tells himself he should sit back and watch, observe and form a tactical plan for where he should be in this, like a battle plan, but very quickly he finds that unworkable. It’s only later, when he sits down, that he finds a few moments to think. 

Rey plops down next to him. “So?”

“It’s a lot,” Poe says. “It didn’t start with this much, right? You built up to it?”

Rey chuckles. “You try going from living in literal isolation for your entire life to sharing a house with no less than eight people. Nine now.”

She pats his knee: his staying is a done deal.

“The bed’s big enough,” she says, “Finn insisted, like you'd be back any night. And I wanted it, too. Can I show you?” 

Grinning wryly, she takes him up winding stairs to his old bedroom. The changes are jarring at first: they've knocked out a wall so it's attached to the adjoining bathroom, and the bed is huge, swallowing up the room, but everything else is charmingly, maybe even tragically, the same. The paint is fresh, but the same color it always was. Most of Poe's old pictures of starships are on the walls, the flimsi yellowing with age. 

It’s an almost painful dichotomy; the past that was so long ago that he could have let it go without any pain, and the present, which is bigger than Poe’d ever imagined. Poe pauses, wondering why two adults had chosen to keep his childhood so close. They hadn’t known him, then. Maybe they hadn’t even really known him when he left, though they were starting to. 

“Why…keep all this?” Poe asks, too tired to filter his thoughts. “I mean, you’re adults. Surely you didn’t want to spend your life surrounded by starship collector’s cards or…badly painted models.”

Poe picks the latter up, turning it over in his hands. It’s an old kit of an X-Wing, painted in the red stripes of Luke’s famous ship. One of the s-foils has been broken and re-glued, a sign that it’s aged without him, too. The corner of his mouth turns up, just a little. “You could have given these to the kids.”

Rey laughs. “You think we... _ care _ ? We're happy to have a bed and each other. And we—Finn—he thought you  _ would _ care, so we left it alone. Now you're back, well, I still don't care. As long as I can sleep here, I don't care what's on the walls. But I'm sure the twins would love to play with those if you don't mind. We wanted them to stay...well, it was something you made. We wanted to keep them safe.”

For all that, he puts it back on the shelf. “I didn’t earn a place here. You two built this together. I can’t—there’s kids,  _ your _ kids. I can’t just step into all this like I never vanished.”

“But it's not like you threw it away, either. It's not like you left us. That punch aside, you didn't kiss me and then leave on purpose. What we had was going somewhere. What you had with Finn was already there. And I've been married to a Finn who has never gone a day without loving you as much as he loves me. It’s not like I’d need to make extra room for you.” She shrugs. “That's what it is. Did you not want kids? Because they're here. We didn't even plan on them, ourselves.”

“Rey,” Poe says, sighing out. “I don’t know what I want. I’m still at a point where I haven’t had any time to think about it. Less than a week ago, I was at war. Less than a month ago, the Resistance was in shambles. Before that, it was all fighting, all surviving. I don’t know what I wanted. I don’t know what I want  _ now _ .”

He sits down, with his back against the wall. “And it’s not fair to make you guys go through that with me, not  _ now _ . Not when you’ve got so much good going on. I mean who’s to say what would have happened if I was here the whole time, but I can’t ever… go back and be there the whole time.”

He gestures helplessly. “Finn is older than I am, now. What do I even do with that?”

“How about you calm down,” Finn says from where he's leaning against the door. “Unless you don't want me now that I'm old.”

He pats the bit of a belly he now has for emphasis. It's something of an act of rebellion after being weighed daily as a stormtrooper, and Rey thinks it’s cute. (She's gained weight, too, though starting from her starvation body weight, she just looks normal.)

“Finn's always wanted to be a sugar daddy,” Rey giggles, sitting on the bed and tugging Poe to sit beside her. 

“Did you wish on a star?” Poe asks, trying to relax. “‘Cause maybe that’s how I got unstuck in time.”

“Pretty sure that even the Force can’t really make a hyperdrive malfunction exactly that way,” Rey says.

“Just lift rocks, huh?” Poe says, amused. He looks up at Finn. “I’m trying to think about this the way I would have felt if uh, Dad had gone ahead and brought another person into our lives after Mom was gone, you know? I’m not saying all this can’t work, or that I don’t want it to, it’s just…it’s a lot.”

“All the kids, or Rey?” Finn asks, not accusing, but wanting to understand. He slides behind Poe, rubbing his shoulders. Rey's shoulder muscles had taken two years to unknot after the war was over. How long would Poe's take? “Rey said you kissed her before...you disappeared.”

“The kids, Rey, the farm’s different…” Poe gestures. “I can handle all that, in increments. I can handle the war being over. But I don’t think I can jump in with both feet and be like ‘sure five kids I met today, call me dad number two’. If you even… want that?”

Poe glances at Finn. “I mean, I like to think what we had was pretty serious. Serious enough that I thought, right before this whole mess happened, we should all really talk. So—I kissed Rey, told her to take care of you while I was gone. It was awkward and I felt like I’d gone all out of order and right before I came out of hyperspace, actually, I was thinking about how I should apologize for it. But, what’s all that compared to ten years of functional, good relationship? A couple weeks?”

He can see that Finn’s about to answer, and Poe bulls onward. “Finn, I don’t want to mess all this up. It’s a lot of pressure  _ to _ not mess it up, if I just try to pick up where we left off.”

Finn sighs and flops back onto the bed. “I get it. It's the belly, isn't it? You don't love me anymore…”

“Finn, he's being serious,” Rey admonishes, and Finn sits up. 

“I know. Look. Poe, I  _ know _ . Give us some credit, we grew up in ten years.”

“We may have already been older than you, in experiences,” Rey points out, sticking her nose in the air haughtily. Poe isn't sure if she's joking.

“What are you gonna mess up, Poe? We're just glad you're  _ alive _ . Rey's missing an arm, me and half the kids have anxiety issues, the other half have anger issues, your dad was  _ depressed to suicidal _ until today, and that's before I even get to the stormtroopers. Honestly, I dare you to try to mess this ‘perfect’ family up any further.” 

Rey lays her mechno hand over Finn's hand, and he relaxes. 

“Those kids have already been through a lot,” Poe explains. “I think it’s better if I don’t show up and immediately expect to mean as much to them as you guys do. I don’t want to mess up that dynamic, first things first.”

“We can take it in increments, though, if that's what you want. Maybe it's smart. I've been in love with you for ten years, but I guess it's not fair to you that I've been in love with the memory of you for longer than I ever knew you.” Finn's eyes sting and his throat tightens. Somehow he thought just getting Poe back would fix everything. Maybe it's not that simple. “There's a guest room, i-if you don't—”

But Finn can't even say it. He thinks it will break his heart to let Poe out of his  _ sight _ . “If it's too much.”

“But we want you to stay,” Rey says, saying what Finn is too polite to say. “We both do. It's been longer for us than for you, and we  _ missed _ you.”

She gives him a wise but playful smile. “But maybe you could start with that apology. What did you want to say to me, ten years or three days ago?” 

“Hoo boy, okay,” Poe say, willing to meet her on that bridge, for sure. “I’m sorry I kissed you without fully making sure it was explicitly okay and then even after realizing it was sort of awkward, figuring I could deal with it later. I didn’t mean to make it awkward. We should talk out what’s okay between us, right? I figure, if we’re going to share a boyfriend, it should be on terms we can all agree on.”

“Hmm,” Rey begins, and is transformed into a girl of nineteen again, playing coy as she grins and bites her lip. “Well, apology accepted. And I agree we need to figure out how to share a boyfriend. How would you like to do that?”

Finn nods: maybe letting Poe take some ownership of the situation will help him to feel more in control. 

Poe shifts. “Well, there was a point where I’d known him longer than you, though by what, a few hours?” 

“So you're arguing you had the prior claim?”

He grins at Rey when she rolls her eyes at him—Finn just laughs. “Bear with me here, okay? I just want to do this the right way. First of all, are you okay with the concept of sharing him with more than, uh, a memory or a concept, or longing glances at my ugly models every now and again?”

Rey is still grinning, holding onto a giggle, and bobs her head in a nod. “Yes.” 

Then she gives this some thought. “I mean, I was ten years ago, and I've had some time to get used to the concept. So, yes.”

She offers Poe her hand, the mechno hand. “And are you willing to share him with me?”

Finn manages to stay quiet, watching this transpire with only a grin. It’s kind of flattering to be argued over, like the pretty girl in a holonovella.

“Yes. I mean, you know my dad. He didn’t raise any kind of homewrecker,” Poe laughs, though it sounds a little nervous. “Is there anything you’d rather we didn’t do? I mean, as far as being intimate, or…I mean, anything you’re not okay with?”

“You and me  _ we _ , or you and Finn  _ we _ ?” Rey shrugs. “I don't want to get pregnant, but I get shots for that.”

“We have five beautiful children already,” Finn muses, rubbing her back, and squeezing Poe's arm. “I would really not like a sixth.” 

“Right. And we've figured out Force use isn't hereditary, so I don't have to feel  _ obligated _ .” Rey looks at Poe. “Unless you mean, like, positions? Finn is pretty confident you'll like what we like.”

“I mean both of those things,” Poe says. “And I’d say Dad’s fine with the grandkids he has, honestly. Right now, five seems like an incredible amount to me and I’m not even sure I can handle that many, so we’ll uh, yeah, no kids. I get shots for that too.”

Rey nods.

“But what I  _ meant _ was, if you’d rather it just all be romantic between uh, between any of the members of this relationship. If you don’t want any part of it to involve a sexual aspect,” Poe struggles, trying to remind himself they’re old enough, have been through enough to know how to talk about this and what they want. He stops, and rubs his face. “What I mean is, if it’s not okay with you, Rey, that I have sex with either you or Finn, we can make this work without that. I don’t want you to think it’s all or nothing and you just have to selflessly let it happen. I want what you want, and I want what he wants, and I want it to be…not a problem for anyone.”

Rey frowns, a puzzled expression. “I—well, okay. Thank you for that. And I know that. But I like sex, and I like you, so I can't see why I wouldn't. Are  _ you _ worried about something?”

She turns to Finn. “You said you had sex with him.”

Finn blinks and flushes darkly. “I mean. We, ah, we. We kinda...fooled around?”

_ Getting handsy in a supply closet counted, right? _

Poe arches his eyebrows at Finn, and then supposes even if he didn’t really know the difference then, he would now. Then again, “I guess if it came down to  _ intent _ , yeah, we did. The only thing that stopped us was having enough time. And what happened before…”

Making a big gesture that encompasses everything, Poe tries to explain, “Doesn’t really have a lot of bearing on all this. Especially if you don’t want—I mean, I’m not sure I want to explain—maybe the little ones it’s easy to just go ‘hey, we have a really good friend and he sleeps in our room,’ but Kira is gonna know what that means and that’s…a little weird for me.”

“Would you rather us smuggle you in here?” Finn jokes. “You really are still in war mode.”

“Kira also knows that her dad has been in love with you as long as she's known her dad,” Rey puts in. “I think she'd be more concerned if you slept anywhere else.”

“And of course it has bearing on this,” Finn says. “Especially for you. You're worried you can't just waltz back in on us after ten years apart—well I can't imagine leaving you out in the cold when, for you, we just got hot and heavy in a closet a few  _ days _ ago.”

“Buddy,” Poe laughs. “If anyone knows the definition of ‘keeping a light on,’ it’s absolutely you. And I never would have asked you to set your whole life aside just to keep waiting for me. I just want everything to stay…normal.”

“Poe, these kids don't know what normal is. And what is normal? They're safe and loved by people who are patient with them. They're too busy learning how to not fight with their siblings to worry if mom and dad have a new boyfriend. Kira was in the First Order until she was ten. Her idea of all relationships is kind of skewed. Much like mine and Finn's was.” Rey's eyes get sad. “I wonder a lot how things would have been with you there from the beginning. Fewer UTIs and things, I'm guessing.”

She shrugs, practical. 

Poe winces, but accepts her point. “Okay. I mean, at the moment, I’m willing to try, but I think…I should ease into it.” 

He reaches out, takes Finn’s hand, takes Rey’s with his other, “I’m sorry I’m the one who has to ask you two to be patient with me but, uh, let’s take this in steps, okay? Let me be sure I can really handle getting my head out of the war, and that I’m in any way cut out for parenthood, and that a week of it doesn’t make me want to run back to the NRDF and re-enlist.”

Rey raises her eyebrows in mild surprise. “I'm not sure you're allowed to just  _ run off _ anymore.”

“You're definitely not,” Finn says, smiling, but serious. “And the NRDF would  _ bore _ you now. But we'll take care of you. As slow or fast as you want.”

Mostly, Poe was kidding. He kisses Finn’s knuckles, gently, then Rey’s. “Also, we can take the starships down. Uh, or at least.... Do you guys have holos of your life the last ten years? You should put those up in here.”

“Only if we can get one with you and BB-8 in it to put up, too,” Finn says. 

Poe thinks that can be arranged.


	6. Chapter 6

There are always going to be moments where Poe is struggling to catch up, he thinks. He sometimes stands in the center of everything and seems lost to it, or lost from it, trying to figure out how  _ he _ got here, a piece that doesn’t fit. After the first seven days, those periods where he seems uncertain or lost or withdrawn don’t last very long. 

BB-8 seems to have organized a whole strike force to keep Poe from feeling detached or out of place. If the droid doesn’t handle it himself, then one of the kids has a question, needs a hand, or—some other trouble happens. Someone has a breakdown. Farm equipment needs fixing. Or Kes, who knows every single one of Poe’s weaknesses, needs to talk.

Today hasn’t been a good day; rather, intense. Hard. Harsh. Poe’s no longer a novelty to the kids and he feels on uncertain footing with several of them; Han doesn’t seem to like him on principle, and Leia doesn’t like the stranger being too near her parents. Poe endures a lot of tiny purple shoves, and whining rejections, and tries to take things at her pace. So far as she’s concerned, she was here first.

So when Suralinda Javos shows up, toting a recorder droid, she finds Poe elbow deep in a busted farm machine, attempting to extricate one of Luke’s belongings that had been shoved down into it for ‘unknown reasons’ and by persons unknown, while the work backs up behind him and Poe does his best not to mangle the toy any worse than it already has been. 

“Can you save it?” Luke is begging.

“I’m trying,” Poe promises, before his eyes light on the reporter. “Shhh—“

He stops his swear before it finishes. He’s not been very good at that. 

“So, Mr. Dameron, the war’s over, what are you going to do next?” Suralinda asks him, like he’s just won the Galactic Boloball Tournament and expects him to answer that he’s going to Dixneyland. 

Then she goes in for a hug. “You  _ moof-milker _ , I can’t believe you’re alive! It’s so good to see you! What seems to be the problem, here?” 

Poe gives her a warm hug, glad to see her. “It’s good to see you too, Suralinda. The camera I’m a little less glad to see, but…” 

He shrugs. It was bound to happen sooner or later. “But, there seems to be a  _ Mister Action Action Rodian _ stuck in the main drive gear here, and I’m trying to get it out without damaging it, or the machine, any worse.” 

“Oh, man. Good thing Poe Dameron’s on the job,” she says, with complete confidence. Suralinda and Luke consider each other. “Well, you’ve certainly gotten big, mister. You probably don’t remember me. Is it Luke, or Han?” 

“I’m Luke! You can tell because I’m the cute one!” 

“He is the cute one,” Poe agrees, leaning back down into the machine and grunting. He slips, cuts off another swear, and then gets the figure out finally, though his knuckles emerge all scraped up and readying to bleed. He passes the toy back to Luke. “Well, buddy, uh, now he’s got battle damage, right? Like all of us.”

Luke gasps openly. “Thanks, Poe! Oh, gosh! You’re all bleeding! Don’t worry! I’ll go get the First Aid Kit!”

Probably more glad for an excuse to run than worried about Poe’s hand, Luke takes off, completely unconcerned with any damage to the toy, which he clutches in his fist.

“Yikes, you got yourself good there, Commander,” Suralinda says, handing him a disposable napkin from her bag. “...Unless you’d rather me not call you Commander. Pretty sure they want to reinstate you, though. Among other things...” 

“Ah, it’s nothing. It’ll bleed and then it’ll stop,” Poe says, accepting the napkin, supposing he’s glad she didn’t offer to kiss it better or anything, and uses it to towel the worst of the grime away. “You didn’t come all the way out here to take care of my cuts and scrapes.”

She raises both hands defensively. “All this is off the record, of course. But they had to send someone, eventually, and I made them send me.” 

“Uh huh,” Poe says, but it’s not angry, just tolerant. She obviously hasn’t come entirely out of the goodness of her heart. “So they sent you to reinstate me? To what position, exactly?”

He knows better, but he can play stupid for a little while. He makes sure there’s no other debris in the equipment, and then closes up the access panel and powers it back on, sending it out on its way to distribute seeds in one of the fallow fields that’s growing grass for the animals. “Let’s go find a place to sit. It’s been one of those days where if I don’t hide, pirates are going to appear or something.” 

“Ah, haha, oh, no, Commander. I mean, I hear things, but I’m here on behalf of the  _ Galaxy Beacon _ . Not the New Republic Navy. Unless that makes you not want to talk to me?” She follows Poe to a cluster of benches and tables under the shade of some trees—where the hands usually take their lunch, if the weather’s nice, as it is today. But it’s past lunch, now, so no one is around—but far enough from dinner that Poe doesn’t have that excuse, at least. “I expect the NRDF will be by. I’m surprised Snap hasn’t smashed your fields with his cruiser yet.” 

“He said something about rebuilding Mr. Bones and sending his droid after me,” Poe reveals, peeking at his knuckles again to see that the bleeding has begun to stop. “But what does the  _ Galaxy Beacon _ want from some dusty old relic of the past? I don’t know the science of what happened to my hyperdrive, and the  _ Organa _ already requisitioned the V-Wing I came in for study.”

“Uhh, a sentient interest story? Come on, I don’t believe you’re that humble or that dumb, Poe,” she chuckled. “Remember to shift your paradigm a little: there’s no war on, so people want to read about the wayward pilot reuniting with his loved ones. They like a happy ending, and you’re the feather in the cap of this happy ending. Can I interview you?” 

“I’ll make you a deal,” Poe says, leaning on the table, watching the interest light up in her eyes. “You can interview me, but— _ but _ —make sure word gets around that I’m not talking to any other reporters. I mean that. Tell them all I’m a belligerent grouch. ‘Cause as far as I’m concerned, the happy ending is the whole galaxy. Right?”

He offers his non-bleeding hand to shake, to solidify the deal, smiling at his old friend. 

Suralinda smiles a pointy grin. “Poe, that  _ is _ why they sent me. To keep the rest of the vultures off your dad’s farm. Scout’s honor. They want a story on you, they have to get through me. You know I take care of my own interests very well.” 

“It's a deal, then,” Poe says. “Ask away.”

She leans down to speak to her droid, and then glances up. “Mind if I record? Audio only, though I need to get them some pictures. If you invite me to dinner, I’ll get some shots of you and the whole family. Or you can get cleaned up and we can take them outside, whatever you prefer.” 

“Come to dinner,” Poe decides, because he likes Suralinda. “It'll give the kids someone else to ask a thousand questions. Go ahead and record, I trust you. Mostly.”

He winks to take any sting out of it.

“Good answer,” she says. “So. The war’s over. How do you feel about that? How did you find out?” 

“I'm still figuring out how I feel about it,” Poe says, giving her an honest answer. “I'm glad it went favorably, but I also keep wondering when I'll wake up or snap out of it. On bad days, the world almost doesn't make sense this way.”

He taps his fingers idly on the tabletop, sun warm and dry, old wood that's seen a lot of seasons.

“Does it ever feel that way for you? Like you'll wake up back in the middle of it?” He wonders. “Or did seeing it end make it solid?”

“I’m asking the questions here,” she says, in a playful, if warning, tone. “But yeah, maybe just time. Enough to want to go back to my old job. But then...you didn’t really have that. Did you have plans for after the war?” 

“No, I really didn't,” Poe says. “I am, uh, was, only starting to think about what my plans should be. Never was much good at planning anything until it was go time, you know that. I think they’re finally starting to come to me, though. First of all, I want to wait for all this to be old news. Get used to things the way they are. Maybe when it feels real, I’ll make some solid plans.”

“So, ah, Finn and Rey have made the plans for you?” Suralinda asked with a playful smile. “Or is that out-of-bounds? I mean, people will speculate—are already.”

“Hmm,” Poe says. He looks around, as if that were obvious. “They came here, where I was most likely to return to, and set up shop to wait. I mean, I don’t have anything better to do than be here with them, do I?”

He sets his chin in his palm, leaning his elbow on the table. “That’s as juicy as it gets, I’m afraid. Life’s kinda gone down to a kid-safe level, for the most part.”

“Ugh, you can’t send me home with just that,” Suralinda laughs. “They’ll make me make something up. Or say things have gone cold between you. Come on, man, I knew you and Finn were an item before. Is that over now?” 

She strikes a balance between provocation and companionate interest, and Poe doesn’t forget that she’s a former comrade-in-arms, yes, but she’s also good at her job. Reporting.

“No, it’s not over,” Poe says. “It’s just moving at a sane pace. I mean, listen. I’m not sure the outcome could have possibly been any better if I had been here the whole time. Look at this, it’s amazing, and they left a place for me in all of it. I’m gonna figure out how to fit in it, but why rush it?”

He grins at her. “Did you ever think you’d hear me say ‘I’m gonna take things nice and slow’ ?”

This surprised a genuine laugh out of Suralinda. “No, I haven’t. So does this mean you’re turning over a new leaf? Or is this the...oh, you know, the life of a soldier still? Long periods of extreme boredom punctuated by brief moments of sheer terror?” 

“You try jumping feet first into even partial responsibility for five kids and tell me you don’t have at least a few brief moments of sheer terror,” Poe grumbles, and then glances at the camera. “Uh, maybe that last part’s off the record…”

She doesn’t make any promises, and Poe forges onward. 

“Terror or not, it’s way more rewarding. Plus, I still get to fly,” Poe says. “ _ Maybe _ a little less thrilling than when there was a threat I’d get blown out of the sky.”

“You think you’ll go back to flying? Maybe the commercial piloting sector, where you can—” 

“Poe! Poe! Oh, thank the Force you’re still alive! I found the First Aid Kit!” Luke shouted as he returned, and at the last few feet he tripped, sending the sterile contents of the First Aid Kit sprawling into the dirt. 


	7. Epilogue

“‘As i watched the former poster boy (literally, see the included images recovered from the archives of fellow revolutionary Yolo Ziff) for the Resistance do his best to logic that you can’t actually injure yourself on a first-aid kit with a sniffling youth,’” Rey reads, displaying the article’s included pictures for Finn, as Poe groans with his hands over his eyes. “‘I realized something. First, maybe he hadn’t gotten everything figured out yet about how little logic matters in the galaxy of a ten year old, and second, he was going to be just fine.’”

“Okay,” Poe protests,  _ “okay _ . That’s like, that’s all way too much.”

“I like it,” Rey said, passing the datapad to Finn so he could read for himself. 

“Did they ever write any about the galaxy’s last Jedi as a first time mom or anything?” Poe wonders, peering out from beneath his smothering fingers.

“If they had, I’d have mind-tricked them into forgetting the time I put Leia down in her seat for a nap and then lost her,” Rey admits. “I mean, she didn’t go anywhere, but I forgot where she was and spent two hours looking. She was just right there in her seat sleeping, right where I left her.”

Poe looks at her like he doesn’t quite believe it, but then thinks about it. “Well, she is awfully quiet, when she’s not telling me to go away.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, she gets fussy with everyone but Mama,” Finn says.

“Hey!” Luke realizes, following along with Finn from where he sat in his lap, “They’re talking about me! I  _ didn’t  _ cry!” 

“Yeah, you did, you big baby,” Han says.

“Cool it, Han,” Shadrak said, pulling his little brother in for a hug, with a kind of slow, inevitable strength. “You know what we get for being mean to our brother. More hugs. It’s clear from your bratty behavior that you didn’t get enough hugs as a child.” 

“Ugh!  _ Shaddo _ ! Let go!” Han complained, but, while only a few standard years older, the Abednedo was far bigger and stronger, and hugged his brother into submission. 

Finn grins at them, glad that Shadrak and Kira were old enough to start to take over some of the ‘parenting.’ “It’s a nice article. Javos is good people. She interviewed me at the end of the war, and later, me and Rey as part of a piece remembering the General. It’s really nice. We’ve got a copy somewhere. Oh, look, she got a nice picture of all of us together watching BB-8.  _ That  _ one’s going up on the wall.” 

[Oh, it’s fine. No one show the droid] BB-8 says. 

“Sorry, Bee, here you go,” Kira, who is enamored with the droid, says, sitting on the floor to show BB-8 the article, and even to upload it into his computer.

[It is a good picture!] BB-8 reports. [Friend-Poe looks very happy.]

If Poe didn’t know any better, BB-8’s burble might have almost sounded pointed. Of course the droid adores it here, feeling like there’s finally enough attention focused on his orange-and-white dome, but if Kira has a special fondness for the droid, the droid downright adores her. Poe may have to accept that the bulk of responsibility will soon change, given that he’s never really thought of himself as owning BB-8. Idly, he wonders where R2-D2 had gone off to. 

Climbing out of his own mortification, Poe looks around and supposes that this, with kids spread out on the living room floor, all happy (well, maybe except Han who was still trying to shove Shadrak’s aggressive hugging technique off) and recently fed and mostly calm, is about as good as it gets. 

“I guess I am pretty happy,” Poe answers, “and I’m not just saying that because you all outnumber me.”

“Good, ‘cause we can totally hug you into submission,” Shadrak says, gleefully demonstrating by turning his attentions on Poe.

“Boy do I know it,” Poe agrees, with a lapful of Abednedo. 

Then Shadrak becomes thoughtful, as he is wont to do. “If you marry our mom and dad, what do we call you?”

Apparently Suralinda’s tantalizing hints at rekindled romance in her article were not subtle enough. 

“We could call him PoePoe, like Papa, only with Poe,” Kira says, clearly having thought of this already, and pleased with her joke. 

“Please don’t,” Poe says, “Just one Poe is enough.”

Finn snorts. “Well, Poe, what would you like them to call you?”

“I'm calling him PoePoe,” Kira says, sounding a lot like her mother, except that she's grinning enough that she  _ might  _ be joking.

“You really could just keep calling me Poe,” Poe offers, but this is met with universal, groaning rejection. Shadrak hugs him harder, and that kid is strong. 

“Nope, no good,” Luke decides, leaning around Rey. “That’s what  _ mom and dad _ are going to call you.”

“So you’re demoting me from a name?” Poe asks, amused. “Well, I prefer to think of myself as the cool one. So you can call Finn Dad, and me ‘Cool Dad’.”

“That automatically makes you way less cool,” Kira laughs, and BB-8 beeps an agreement, leaving Poe wondering who’s side the droid is actually on. 

“Well, I think PoePoe is cool,” Finn says with a chuckle. 

“Yeah, but you're old, so you don't know what cool is,” Han says, matter-of-factly, and Finn winks at Poe. 

Finn genuinely likes being the oldest. Poe kind of always acted young for his age, he thinks, while Finn has always been an old soul.

“How about a nice normal ‘Papa,’” Rey says, sounding tired. She's rocking Leia, who has gone from giggly to fussy to unconscious in the last fifteen minutes. “That is,  _ if _ we marry him. He hasn't asked us.”

“You haven’t asked me, either,” Poe reminds, with a wink. He knows he’s the holdup, here.

“Good! I hate mushy stuff!” Han says, but Poe is beginning to learn when the young ex-stormtrooper is posturing and pretending not to care when he actually cares a lot, and that's probably what this is. 

Luke and Shadrak gasp openly and turn to Poe:

“But you're  _ gonna _ , right?”

“We want you to be part of our family!”

“Officially!” (The First Order kids would probably always prefer things to be  _ official _ .)

“Well, first of all, I’d be officially part of your family no matter what since my dad is your grandpa,” Poe reassures them all. “I guess he’d just be double grandpa if we all tied the knot.”

“What knot?” Shadrak asks, obviously confused.

“It’s uh, it’s just an expression. For getting married,” Poe explains. “‘Cause a long time ago when you got engaged to be married there’d be a ceremony where you both put your hands together and they tied a ribbon around them. It’s a little different now.”

“Kira,” Luke exclaims brightly. “You have ribbons somewhere, don’t you?”

Kira mirrors (or humors) her little brother's excitement, and scrambles up, BB-8 and Luke (and even Han) following to oversee the mission. 

Finn laughed. “Oh, you're on for it now, Poe. I'd say you have about thirty seconds to run—or ask the question.”

Shadrak, who really is a sweet boy, and has taken a great liking to Poe, is watching Poe hopefully. 

“Oh lord,” Poe says, knowing he’s in for it when even  _ Han _ is watching with interest. “This is not how I thought this day was going to go.”

“So you had other plans?” Rey asks, sweetly. She knows Poe is trapped between her and Finn, and under Shadrak. 

“Uh, they probably did not involve getting tied to you two by enthusiastic junior sadists,” Poe says.

“What’s a—” Shadrak starts.

“No, I’ll answer that in about uh, six…make that ten years,” Poe says. “Not today.”

“You should see the gear Rey’s got in our—”

“Ten years!” Poe says again. 

“I could look it up,” Shadrak tries.

But Finn wraps his arms around the big boy and pulls him onto his own lap, so that Poe is not quite so trapped. “Give it a few years, kiddo.” 

Rey leans into him a little closer. “Time’s running out, Poe.”

“This is coercion,” Poe protests, playfully. 

“Mmm-hmm,” Rey agrees, playing with his hair with her mechno-hand. 

“Do you two really want this?” Poe asks, probably a genuine question. 

“Of course we do,” Finn says, leaning in, trapping him after all. “We always have.” 

“There he goes, being all head-of-household again,” Rey teases, jogging Poe with her elbow like she can elbow Finn through him. “For what it’s worth, yes, Poe. I really want this.” 

She turns to fix him with a firm stare. “You’re a good man, Poe Dameron. And I don’t need the Force to tell me that.”

“But it helps,” Finn puts in.

“Yes, well, it helps. You’re good through and through,” she confirms with a grin. 

“I could change,” Poe says, with a wink. “I’m still young.”

It doesn’t work, so he finally sighs, relents. It’s not the image he had in his head of the day he proposed to—well, anyone—but, Poe also can’t imagine spending his life with anyone else, or any other place. When he’d first gotten here, it felt alien and strange and nothing like what he’d thought he was coming back to, but he’s adapting. There’s nothing else familiar in the galaxy  _ to _ go back to, and if Poe’s honest with himself, everything he wants is right here. Maybe he’d have made some decisions differently, out of a fear that it wouldn’t work out, but here was the proof all in the pudding, to use another expression Poe should probably not mention around the kids.

“Okay,” Poe says, trying to ignore the nervous part of himself that suggests a million things that could go wrong; he knows that at least one thing will absolutely go right. They’re both going to say yes. “Can I join your marriage, uh, as an equal part?”

“Oh, now, see, I thought he was going to ask to be our pet,” Rey teases, and now Finn jogs her-through-Poe. 

“I mean, if that’s the arrangement you  _ want, _ ” Poe starts.

“We already have pets, mom,” Shadrak points out, and Rey realizes perhaps the children are getting too old for these kinds of jokes to be made around them. 

“Just say yes!” Finn groans, as the children return, feet thundering. From somewhere, Kes shouts at them to stop running in the house. 

“Grandpa, come on, you’ll want to see this!” Luke cries, going back for Kes, and dragging him into the living room to witness the impomptu handfasting, explaining, “They’re gonna tie the knot!” 

“Oh, are they now?” Kes asks, standing there wearing an apron with his hands on his hips. 

“Rey hasn’t said yes yet. I said yes. Yes!” Finn says, caught up in the frenzy. 

Rey leans in to kiss Poe. “Yes.” 

Han, perhaps enthusiastic for some ‘practical’ application of his scout-knots, immediately begins tying their hands (and arms) together. 

“I...don’t think that’s right,” Luke says. 

Poe kisses Rey, and then turns to kiss Finn, sweet and soft, and then draws back from  _ that _ with a groan. “You know Suralinda’s going to want to come back and write a followup piece when word gets out.”

“Problems for later,” Rey says, turning Poe back to kiss him again. 

He has to break the kiss to protest, “That’s too tight!”

“You’re being too goopy,” Han says, utterly serious. “Now you’re our prisoner.”

“That’s not how this—”

Kes, trying to stifle a laugh, only intercedes when the kids start going for their ankles. “Okay, kids, it’s not a potato sack race.”

Later, when they manage to get themselves untied and put the kids to bed, Finn catches Poe while he’s taking off his shoes, and slides his arms around him. “I meant it, you know. Every word. But—I don’t want to rush you, either. You’re still calling the shots, okay?” 

He kisses Poe’s cheek and leaves him with his thoughts, joining Rey at the sink to get ready for bed. 

“I’m happy with this development,” Poe promises. “I’m not in a rush to have a big ceremony or anything. I mean, not that I ever wanted that.”

He waits for a place to open up at the sink; they’d found a compromise, even with the big bed. The first couple nights, Poe had contented himself to sleep on a cot, until Finn had managed to pin him down on the bed for a late afternoon nap that turned into an all-night affair and no one’s honor was besmirched at the end of it. Now they sleep comfortably, the three of them, at least unless Leia had a nightmare and then both Finn and Poe got kicked out of the bed by a very insistent and petulant toddler. 

“I mean, unless you guys wanted the whole shebang,” Poe says. “I know you didn’t really get it the first time around. If you promise I don’t have to write my own vows, which would be terrible if you made me do it out of spite, we can have whatever kind of ceremony you like. Uh, including none.”

He sets to brushing his teeth, then, which causes his nervous chatter to pause for practical reasons. 

“I think I'd like a wedding,” Rey says with a chuckle. “We should: for the sake of the children.”

“I think Kes would be thrilled,” Finn adds. He's laid his hand on the small of Poe's back and is rubbing absently, waiting for him to finish brushing his teeth. 

Rey moves to the bed and sits there brushing her hair, and Finn follows, waiting until she's done so he can braid it. They're both still looking at Poe, and are almost transported back in time, when Poe was older and maybe wiser and knew how the world worked, and they were waiting to follow his lead. 

“Well, then we should have one, just the way you guys decide,” Poe says, leaning in the doorway to the bathroom and watching them together with soft eyes. Maybe it’s that moment he realizes that he’d give either of them the moon if they asked for it, and they very obviously feel the same about him, or maybe it’s been a slow process of realization this whole time. When it comes down to it, Poe knows tomorrow’s uncertain; maybe someday the galaxy will decide to take him back, pull him away again. With that, can he really afford to spend time worried about the future when he could be making them happy  _ now _ ? Not just Rey and Finn, but all three of them?

He smiles, slow and warm, just watching them before he joins them, for once not because they feel beyond his reach but because they’re beautiful together, good and comfortable and everything he likes is evident in the way they interact with each other.. “But I’m still not writing my own vows. I mean it.”

When he joins them, they forgive his stubbornness on the subject with softness, just the way they always have. 

“Don't let Rey write them, or you really will end up our pet,” Finn chuckles, tying off Rey's hair so he can open up his arms for Poe and pull him into a kiss, letting him slot between them. “We can just use traditional ones.”

“You're no fun,” Rey teased, leaning  in to get a kiss, too. “I did lock the door, so we could…”

“Pretend it's our honeymoon already?” Finn suggests with a grin. “Deflower our blushing bride?”

Finn is looking at Rey when he says this, and Poe's the one blushing in their combined hold. He turns back to Poe: “Between you and me, I'm glad you're here. I'm getting a little too old to keep her pleased all by myself…”

Rey shoves him and they both laugh. 

“I’m not that much younger than you are,” Poe says, amused. “And now you gotta satisfy me, too, buddy. Still sure you’re not making a tactical error?”  

They ease together into a comfortable pile, kissing and touching, exploring, and then Poe suddenly pulls back from Finn, with a mock-serious expression on his face. “I gotta confess, I’m not a virgin. Do you still want me?”

Rey laughs outright, and Finn snorts. “We aren’t either.” 

“Like I said, we were  _ expecting  _ you to be the one with the experience,” Finn says, with his arms around both of them, and he pulls them down on top of him to try a three-way kiss. 

It mostly ends badly, with lots of teeth and giggling. 

“Okay, but are you a threesome virgin?” Finn asks. He’s running his hands through their hair—both of them have baby-soft, fine hair, and he just loves the feel of it through his fingers. 

“Uhhh, I am not required to testify against myself, am I?” Poe asks, hiking Finn’s hips up against his and reaching back to rub Rey’s back, where it gets sore from carrying Leia around.

“Either way, he’s out of practice,” Rey says.

“That’s right. You haven’t had sex for ten years,” Finn laughs.

“From a certain point of view.” 

This is clearly an inside joke of some kind, but Poe has the rest of his life to get in on it.

“Right. From a certain point of view.” 

“I’ve been saving myself,” Poe agrees, playing right into this game. “And if that’s the case, we’re all wearing an awful lot of clothes.” 

“Maybe it's time I show you what this baby can do,” Rey says, raising her mechno arm in front of Poe's face and wiggling her fingers. 

Finn laughs, tugging Poe's shirt up and over his head while Rey works at the buttons of his own shirt—freakishly fast. “Oh, buddy. Now we're in for it.”

“That’s  _ intimidating _ ,” Poe mentions, with a grunt as he starts working on getting Finn’s pants off. “Are you trying to assert your dominance? I’d never challenge it.”

But the mechno-arm is surprisingly soft on his skin, even if it is very quick on his buttons, and Poe’s wariness fades as they’re all bared to each other, perfect and imperfect each of them in different parts. The old scars are big, the newer ones smaller and more typical of life. They’re both warm, comfortable, reassuring. Poe fits between them, just the way any of them will fit in the middle, as needed.  _ Here, right here,  _ Poe thinks, as Finn’s hand closes on him at last and he turns to kiss Rey without any embarrassment or reserve at last,  _ it’s like time will never catch up with them at all. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> A fic idea thought up while we were listening to the dulcet tones of Neil Degrasse Tyson and wondering how _Star Wars_ would look if physics actually worked.


End file.
